


a curse is only as real as you let it be

by kahakais



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Curses, F/M, Katara (Avatar)-centric, Magical Realism, Minor Character Death, POV Katara (Avatar), This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, i'm always putting these fools in a tea shop, it's kya! again, this was originally going to be a one shot but i broke it up into smaller drabble type things
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:33:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 11,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27805408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kahakais/pseuds/kahakais
Summary: In the months after Kya’s death, Katara does her research. She studies dusty books full of family history and reads and rereads ancient tomes on curses and spells and old, old magic. She comes to the same conclusion every time.There is a curse on the women in Katara’s bloodline. No one knows who cast it or how it got there, but it is always, always the same.Katara cannot fall in love with someone who loves her back. If she does, she will die.There is no cure. There is no spell. There is no solution.
Relationships: Katara & Kya (Avatar), Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 95





	1. i hold my hands over the ears of my heart (so that i will not hate you)

**Author's Note:**

> this is so self indulgent! i love it anyways
> 
> apologies in advance lol

Katara is six when her mother tells her that she is cursed.

“What do you mean, Mama?” Katara asks. She’s curled up in Kya’s lap as they sit near the fire; her mother’s hands brushing gently through her hair. 

Kya hesitates for a minute before continuing. “There is a curse,” she says, and she hates that she has to tell this to her daughter, but there is no other way. She cannot hide it. She doesn’t have the time. “On the women in our bloodline.”

“A curse?” Katara asks, her voice small and filled with wonder, in a way that only a child’s can be. “Like...in the storybooks?”

Kya laughs, soft and sad. “Almost, but not quite,” she says. There is a pause in the conversation, and Kya closes her eyes and wishes that she could freeze this moment and stay in it forever. Her and her daughter and the fireplace. She thinks it could be all she needs, if only the universe would let her.

“Listen to me, Katara,” Kya says. “This is a curse that has plagued us for as far back as I can remember. My mother, and my mother’s mother, and her mother’s mother, we all suffered from the same thing. And one day, you will too.”

“But what _is_ it,” Katara says impatiently, wiggling around in Kya’s arms to look her in the eye. Her face is wrinkled up in confusion, and she looks so much like her father that it feels like a physical blow to Kya’s chest. It isn’t possible for her to feel this much love and survive. It really, really isn’t.

Kya inhales shakily. “One day,” she whispers. “One day, you will meet someone. Someone who knows everything about you. Someone you makes your heart race and your blood sing. Someone who you would do anything for. Someone you love, who loves you back in equal measure.”

“That doesn’t _sound_ like a curse,” Katara says. Even at six, she is a hopeless romantic. She loves fairytales and magic and happy endings. The irony of it all breaks Kya’s heart- it makes her want to scream and rage and throw things, because despite her daughter’s hopes and dreams, magic will not be kind to her. She will not get a happy ending. “That sounds nice.” 

“It is nice,” Kya says around the lump in her throat. “It’s wonderful. But it takes everything you have and everything you are. That’s the curse.” 

Big, blue eyes look up at Kya in confusion. “I don’t understand, Mama.”

Kya presses a kiss to her daughter’s forehead. Blinks back tears. “One day, my love,” she murmurs. “One day, you will.”

Two years later, Kya is dead.

Katara understands. 

-

Kya dies when Katara is eight for reasons science cannot comprehend. It doesn’t matter. Science cannot explain what Katara already knows.

Her mother died for love. She loved with her whole heart and soul, and in return, love crushed her from the inside out, the same way it crushed her grandmother and great-grandmother and all the women before. The same way it would crush Katara if she ever gave it the chance.

In the months after Kya’s death, Katara does her research. She studies dusty books full of family history and reads and rereads ancient tomes on curses and spells and old, old magic. She comes to the same conclusion every time.

There is a curse on the women in Katara’s bloodline. No one knows who cast it or how it got there, but it is always, _always_ the same.

Katara cannot fall in love with someone who loves her back. If she does, she will die.

There is no cure. There is no spell. There is no solution. 

Detachment is almost too easy, at that point. Katara looks around at the wreck her mother leaves behind- broken husband, grieving brother, daughter who now has to be strong for everyone- and she knows in her heart of hearts that she can’t continue this legacy. It would be irresponsible. It would fracture her family even further. It’s not an idea she can entertain.

So at eight, Katara rids her room of romantic stories. She throws away her princess dresses and her thoughts of knights in shining armor. She puts away her toys and paints and everything that allows her to dream of something fanciful- everything that reminds her of her mother- and she turns her head towards something sensible instead.

She’ll become a doctor, she decides. There’s absolutely nothing romantic about medicine.

-

Katara grows up alone.

She has Sokka, and she has her father, even though he feels far away and impermanent, like a spirit or a will-o’-the-wisp. But she has no friends. 

It’s purposeful. If she pushes people away, they won’t have any opportunity to slip between the cracks in her ribcage and fill up the chasm in her chest. If she pushes people away, they won’t get hurt, and neither will she. 

This existence is tiring. Katara can be mean and petty and cold if she wants to, but her first nature is to be kind. And she can’t be kind. 

Her mother was kind. Kya was kind and loving and she smelled like seasalt and currant and cookies from the oven. Kya liked to tell Katara stories and brush her hair and take her to the beach to play in the sand. Kya was so kind that it killed her, and Katara doesn’t want to make the same mistakes.

So she grows up alone and lonely, builds walls around her that are stacked five feet high and are twice as thick. She lets mean words spill from her lips like poisoned honey. Keeping her grades up invites attention, it invites praise, so instead, she glares and glowers and stops doing her schoolwork. The practical dream of going to college and becoming a doctor disappears like everything else, down the drain, never to be seen again. She pretends that it doesn’t matter.

It does.

She’s _angry_ and _argumentative_ and _antisocial_ , according to her teachers, and she’s _generally a pain to be around_ , according to Sokka.

Her father is not around enough to pass judgement, but it doesn’t matter, because the townspeople do it for him. _Have you seen Hakoda’s girl?_ They whisper when she walks by. _Hasn’t been the same since her mother died, poor thing. Now she’s an unholy terror._

By the time Katara is a teenager, she has managed to successfully alienate herself from nearly everyone she knows, and even some people she doesn’t. It’s almost impressive. 

Her and her brother are no longer as close as they were when Kya was alive, because Kya’s death means that Katara is suddenly the one who has to _care_. She has to cook and clean and do Sokka’s laundry- it’s not like he can do it himself. He’s always chasing after the ghost of their father, looking for a man who left and who will probably never come back. 

The balance between them is upset. Now Katara has to be the responsible one, the one who keeps the household afloat, and it drives a distance between them. It could be easily crossed, she thinks, if she tried a little harder, if she let him in, but she can’t. So she doesn’t.

-

By the time Katara turns twenty, she’s had enough. Enough of her hometown and all of its ghosts, enough of the strained silence between her and her brother and her father. Detachment comes easily for her once again, so she packs all of her possessions into a single box and says goodbye. No one tries to stop her when she goes to the city to find work and build a life of her own— not that she expected them to.

Pushing people away has grown old. Katara is tired of being vindictive; tired of wearing cruelty on her shoulders like an oversized coat. The curse and her mother feel so far away, and yet they still hover in the back of her mind, omnipresent. But it’s hard to be alone in the big city— harder than it ever was in the tiny town she grew up in.

So she changes the pattern, just a little bit. Gets a job at a slightly shitty tea shop and an apartment right above it. She makes uneasy acquaintances out of her coworkers. Their names are Suki and Toph, and they are both students at the local university. Katara likes them well enough, but her relationships with them are so _shallow_.

It’s out of necessity, of course, but it still hurts. 

It stings, to know that she has become so used to pushing people away to the point where anything else feels unnatural. 

-

Sometimes, Katara allows herself to dream of a life where she can go to school, and make friends, and fall in love with a boy who makes her smile. Sometimes she dreams that there is no curse, that her mother is still alive, that she got to grow up with Kya’s smile and laugh and gentle hands and a family that was happy and whole.

That’s all it is, though. Just dreams. 

This curse is her only companion, and she hates it. She hates the way it feels like a physical presence in her life, heavy and oppressive and always there. She hates the way she aches inside when groups of friends come into the tea shop, laughing and boisterous and loud. She hates the way she has to make Toph and Suki her only exceptions, albeit poor ones, when she knows that she could have more- she _should_ have more- if only there wasn’t this bane in her blood. 

The longing burns her from the inside out, more than any curse ever could. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title from deathless by catherynne valente


	2. whoever built you sewed irony into your sinews

Katara’s job at the tea shop is easy enough. She mans the cash register and bakes pastries in the back room and works the espresso machine because neither Suki nor Toph know how to do it. The other two girls are always chatty, and they do their best to include her, but Katara’s life is dull. She doesn’t always have much to contribute to the conversation. Their interactions are limited to the confines of the tea shop, and Katara is— well, not content, exactly, more like _resigned_ — to keeping it that way. 

That’s why it’s a surprise one morning when Suki says, “Katara, one of the frats on campus is throwing a small party tonight. Like, around nine. And I know you’re not a student, but you should still come.” 

Katara startles. This is not an ordinary occurrence. Her immediate gut reaction is to respond with an enthusiastic _yes,_ because even after all these years she still hasn’t learned her lesson. She tamps down on it furiously, tries to cover it up by rolling her eyes. “Absolutely not,” she says, hoping her voice comes out indifferent. “I don’t party.”

Toph snorts in response. “You don’t do much of anything, Sugar Queen,” she says. “You come to work and then you mope in your apartment and it’s pathetic.”

Suki elbows Toph aggressively. Toph elbows her back. 

Katara can only shrug. “Maybe I’m just boring.”

“Listen,” Suki says, her voice cautious. “I know we don’t know each other very well, but you seem nice enough! And I know you’re new around here, so—”

“So what, I’m just a charity case?” Katara snaps, because it’s instinctual for her to respond to kindness that way. Old habits die hard, after all.

“Um, _no_ ,” Toph responds, annoyance tinging her voice. In another life, Katara suspects that her and Toph would be great friends. The younger girl can dish it out nearly twice as well as she can take it. “It’s like Suki says. You seem cool, and you’re new, and we want you there.”

Katara’s eyes narrow and she doesn’t respond, because this is uncharted territory and she doesn’t know how to proceed. 

“Listen,” Suki interjects, in an attempt to smooth things over. “I’ll give you the address, and you can think about it, okay?”

Katara nods stiffly and turns back to the espresso machine, because she’s not sure what else to do. The rest of her shift passes in awkward silence. 

-

It’s odd, because this invitation is something she’s been secretly wanting for years and years and _years_ . The possibility of companionship, of finally being seen, are _right in front of her_ , but she is too scared to reach out and take it. She’s already crossed a line with her almost-but-not-really friendships with Suki and Toph at the tea shop. This party can really only bring more trouble, and besides, Katara didn’t spend the majority of her life pushing people away to just undo it all in one night. It’s a risk she can’t afford.

She doesn’t know much about the curse, just that it will strike when she least expects it to, and that’s why it’s important to never give it the opportunity. That’s why she stays away, locks everything into the tiny recesses of her mind. It’s easier. 

But as nine o’clock draws nearer, she finds herself wavering. She’s been doing this for years, she rationalizes. Just one night of fun can’t hurt. One night, where she can forget about the curse and her mother and her pain. One night where she can act her age, one night where she can put on a fake smile and pretend. A reprieve from the loneliness. Hasn’t she earned it? 

It’s easier than it should be to decide. 

-

Katara arrives at the address Suki gave her, and balks, because what she thought would be a _small party_ is actually not a small party at all. There are so many _people_ , and all of her half baked ideas of socializing and driving away the quiet immediately disappear. Music is playing and people are dancing and talking and laughing, and Katara, who has made it her life’s purpose to never interact with more than two people at a time, is incredibly overwhelmed. Once upon a time, she was an extrovert- happy and cheery and sociable and loud. But that was years ago, and things are different now. Too different. 

Her breath is suddenly coming short and fast. _This was a mistake. This was a mistake. This was a mistake_ . Why did she think she could do this? She can’t ever, _ever_ do something like this.

She needs to leave, but she can’t get enough air, so she stumbles towards the front porch steps and collapses, her legs feeling boneless. She buries her head in her arms.

This was a dumb idea. She knew it was a dumb idea, and she did it anyways. But fuck, she’s just turned twenty, and she’s spent most of her life alone out of necessity, and she’d just wanted _one night_ where everything was okay. One night where she could act like she was normal, where she could pretend that she wasn’t so lonely that it hurt.

Katara doesn’t know how long she sits on the porch steps while the party rages on in the house behind her. It could be minutes, it could be hours. Time doesn’t exist in that moment. Her breathing steadies, after awhile, and all that’s left is a feeling of numbness. 

She is only jolted from her reverie when a pair of legs slam into her head.

“ _Ouch,_ ” Katara cries indignantly, scrambling off the steps to see who has run into her. It’s a boy who’s just come stumbling out of the party. He looks incredibly disgruntled. 

“What are you doing down there?” snaps the boy. His voice is a smooth rasp, and Katara’s stomach twists inexplicably, even through her outrage.

“You should watch where you’re going,” Katara says. He hit her head _hard._ There’s probably going to be a bruise. 

“And _you_ should be sitting literally anywhere else,” the boy responds. Katara gets a good look at him then, and her stomach twists even further, because this boy is _pretty._ He has long dark hair, pulled back into a topknot, and a scar on the left side of his face. His eyes are a curious shade of gold. 

There’s a minute where they just size each other up. The Boy is looking at her, now, and he looks just as caught off guard as she feels. His eyes are like molten lava, intense and too bright for the rest of his face. Katara feels flushed hot all over, the pain in her head subsiding as she stares this strange boy down. 

“ _Hey!"_ a new voice says, all loud and filled with excitement, and Katara looks over in alarm. It’s Toph and another boy with a buzzed head and a neon yellow windbreaker. Suki other is trailing behind them with a look of fond exasperation on her face, her auburn hair whipping around in the wind.

The bottom of Katara’s stomach drops out completely. 

Suki waves when she spots Katara and the boy on the front porch. “Katara!” she calls. She actually sounds excited, and it makes Katara’s chest ache. “You made it!”

This catches Toph’s attention. “Katara’s here?” she asks. “ _Really?”_

Katara gawks at them as they approach. She’s not a total imbecile, but this is painfully new and uncomfortable. It also doesn’t help that the boy with the scar, the one who ran into her, is still standing there awkwardly. The long hair and the eyes are doing very weird things to her stomach, which is only making her panic worse. _Stop it_ , she thinks, as if she can will her heart to stop going a million miles per hour through sheer willpower. _Stop it right now._

It’s all too much, and she didn’t-

She doesn’t-

She needs to leave. Right now.

“I have to go,” she gasps out to no one in particular. And then she’s pushing past The Boy with the long hair and the scar, darting around Suki and Toph and the kid with the yellow windbreaker, and she’s running, _running_ back to the safety of her apartment.

“Katara!” she hears Suki’s voice call after her. “Wait, where are you going?” 

She keeps running.

“Spirits, Zuko, what did you _do?_ ” Toph says, and it follows Katara down the sidewalk. But she doesn’t stop. She can’t.

_This was a mistake._

_All of that struggle for nothing_ , a nasty voice whispers in the back of her head. It sounds the way her mother did, the few times she got angry. _All this so you could end up running away and pretending it never happened. You should’ve stayed home._

I know, Katara tells it. She feels empty. She could blow away on the wind. She does not exist.

 _Believe me, I know._

-

Over the course of the next twenty four hours, Katara replays every moment from that ill-fated evening over and over again in her head.

She doesn’t have any explanation for her actions, really. Because she’d wanted _so badly_ to go to the party with others her age and just _forget._ But the second she was presented with the opportunity to do it, she choked. It had seemed so real, suddenly- the possibility of meeting people, maybe even loving them, only to have it yanked away cruelly and without remorse. 

She can hear her mother’s voice again, humming in the back of her brain. Softer, this time. _It takes everything you have and everything you are. That’s the curse._

It’s easy to think that it doesn’t exist when she goes through her day to day life. She can compartmentalize. She can keep others at arm’s length, ignore the threat they represent. She can tamp down on the desire that threatens to come bubbling up from her chest- the desire to _know_ somebody, platonically or romantically. The desire to see and be seen. 

It feels far away when in the tea shop. But last night, as she sat outside on that front porch, as she listened to the sounds of laughter and life spill from that party- it was just too much.

She can’t ever have any of that, she thinks, and it’s a bitter thought. It’s something she’s always known, deep down, of course. But to see it firsthand and realize that no matter how close she comes, it will _never_ be real- well.

It was stupid to even consider.


	3. her heart has an argument with her head (every time it wants to beat)

Routine tells Katara to leave it alone. To shake her worries free, detach like it’s nothing. But her resolve to forget about everything that happened on the night of the party disappears two days later, when she goes downstairs for her shift and sees the boy with the scar chatting with Suki and Toph at the front counter. 

She stumbles over her own two feet, which catches the attention of Toph and her acute sense of hearing.

“Sugar Queen,” Toph calls. “That you?”

“Good afternoon, Toph,” Katara says flatly, and then she makes her way to the espresso machine to get it started. Detachment. Detachment. She can be removed. She’s done it a million times before. Her stomach is fluttering. It doesn’t matter. 

There’s a pause. “Okay, so I don’t really know what you look like,” Toph drawls. “But you _sound_ like shit.”

“Toph,” hisses Suki. “Don’t be rude.”

Toph waves a hand in dismissal. “Sugar Queen doesn’t mind. Right?” 

Katara grumbles something incoherent under her breath and goes back to the espresso machine. Stupid Toph and Suki, who don’t know how to leave well enough alone. 

Suki clears her throat. “Ah, Katara,” she says. “This is Zuko.” She’s gesturing to the boy with the scar, the one who ran into her at the party. 

“I’ve met him before,” Katara replies, her voice short. “He hit me in the head.”

Toph lets out a snort of laughter.

“Sorry about that,” says the boy- Zuko. His voice is still raspy smooth. “Nice to meet you again.”

_The feeling isn’t mutual,_ Katara wants to snark back, but she holds her tongue. It’s not like there’s a point. She’s already made a fool out of herself in front of this boy. No sense in doing it twice. 

She ignores the part of her that’s friendly, that craves companionship, that wants to turn around and introduce herself properly. An awkward silence falls. Katara finishes stabbing the buttons of the espresso machine with poorly disguised ferocity and starts to head towards the back to organize the baked goods.

“Oh, Katara, wait,” says Suki, before Katara can completely retreat. She jerks her thumb at Zuko. “Um, Zuko actually starts working today. Just wanted to let you know.”

“ _What_ ,” Katara grits out. This cannot be real. She doesn’t know this boy- she doesn’t _want_ to know him- but he irks her. She has enough shit to deal with already. She doesn’t have the _energy_ to keep another person away.

“Yeah,” Zuko says sheepishly, one hand coming up to rub the back of his neck. “Um, my uncle owns this place, and I needed a job, so…”

“Tui and _La,_ ” Katara snarls, and she can’t take it anymore, so she stomps off towards the back room. Something hot and ugly is rising in her throat, but this is her own damn fault, really. _She’s_ the one who decided to come to this city. _She’s_ the one who has this curse on her shoulders.

Of course, that doesn’t make it hurt any less.

Just because something is fate does not mean it is kind. In fact, that is rarely ever the case. 

-

Katara is a ghost in her own life. That has never been made more clear to her than after Zuko starts working at the shop. 

His camaraderie with Toph and Suki is so _natural_ and _easy-_ it makes her seethe, because she wishes _so badly_ that she could be that way. The halfhearted place Katara has etched out for looks like it's slowly disappearing, because _Zuko_ is becoming everything she could not be. He laughs at Toph’s bad jokes and shares witty repartee with Suki. He’s not perfect, of course- he can’t talk to the actual customers to save his life, he’s honestly terrible at making tea, which is the whole damn job- but that doesn’t matter, because he has _friends_. 

He has friends, and Katara has nothing, because Katara can never have _anything_ that is real. It’s almost laughable that she came to this city for a change. Things stay exactly the same everywhere, no matter what she does.

Sometimes she wonders why she even bothers. 

-

“Do you want to hear a joke?” Zuko asks her one day, and it surprises her, because they don’t talk unless necessary. It’s just the two of them in the shop. Suki and Toph aren’t working.

Katara blinks. Once, then twice. “You’re serious?” she asks, after the silence stretches on for longer than what’s comfortable. 

Zuko looks a little mortified. “I mean...yeah.”

Katara turns around to face him completely, abandoning the dough she was kneading on the counter. “Go ahead,” she says, and even though her voice should be venomous, it falls flat.

Try as she might, she cannot truly be callous to him. It’s a damn shame. 

“Ah, well, I don’t remember the first half of it, exactly,” Zuko admits sheepishly. “But the punchline goes, _leaf me alone, I’m bushed._ ” 

Katara gawks at him, because _spirits,_ that was terrible, and the unscarred side of Zuko’s face turns crimson. And then, much to her surprise, she lets out a loud peal of laughter. One of her hands immediately flies up to cover her mouth. Oh, for spirits’ sake. It wasn’t even that _good_. So why is she laughing?

Zuko looks immensely pleased to have gotten a reaction from her, and she can’t have that.

“That wasn’t funny,” she says automatically, a bit of a bite in her voice. Anything to try and keep the butterflies in her stomach at bay.

“You still laughed, though,” Zuko says cheerily. “So it couldn’t have been that bad.” 

Katara flounders for a moment. Words have completely failed her. She’s out of her depth and he keeps looking at her with those stupid eyes and-

“I’m going to go back to the pastries,” she says lamely, because she can’t quite think of anything else. Zuko wilts again in the corner of her eye, and Katara’s chest twinges in sympathy. She ignores it.

Something imperceptible changes that day.

She does not realize it until later, but this moment- seemingly inconsequential, easily forgotten- marks the beginning of the end. 

-

Zuko smiles at Katara when she goes into work the next day. It’s nothing important, just a friendly little grin, but it still sets off a riot of butterflies in her stomach. 

_Stop that_ , she thinks desperately. _You can’t do that_. 

Suki waves, the same way she always does. Toph grunts in greeting, the same way she always does. 

Katara moves around the shop, going through the motions of opening up. 

Zuko and Toph are arguing about something silly, and Suki is egging both of them on. Katara only halfway pays attention, the same way she always does when the three of them talk. So it takes a moment for her to register that someone is calling her name.

“ _Katara_ ,” it’s Toph, her voice shrill but still good natured. “Katara, tell Zuko he’s being dumb and that green tea mochi is better than red bean.”

Katara snorts. “Well, I can’t do that, Toph. Because then I’d be lying.”

Suki laughs, and Zuko smiles at her again. Katara resolutely ignores the feeling she gets in her chest. 

“Neither of you have taste,” Toph proclaims. “Like, at all.”

“Aw,” Zuko croons. “Don’t be bitter because you’re _wrong_ , Toph.”

Toph hits him on the shoulder, and Katara can’t stop the warmth that spreads through her like a sunrise over the horizon. That feeling becomes a recurring theme at all the shifts that follow.

-

Life drags on, the way it always has without her. Zuko’s presence at the tea shop stops making Katara’s skin rankle, and he ingratiates himself into her routine soon enough. 

Outside of that one stupid joke, they don’t talk much- neither of them are very adept at small talk. But she finds herself having grown used to his presence anyways, and it’s ridiculous, really, because Zuko doesn’t even _do_ anything. This boy, over such a short period of time, has gotten under her skin in a way no one else ever has. And he’s different, somehow, than Suki and Toph, because when she’s with Suki and Toph she doesn’t feel this way. She doesn’t feel like she’s constantly toeing an invisible line.

Katara wonders what it says about her, when this type of interaction should be the simplest thing on the planet, but instead is so _draining_.

She is so tired. She will never be able to stop and rest.

-

Suki and Toph and Zuko have another friend who comes into the tea shop sometimes. He’s the same boy from the party, the one with the buzzed head and the yellow windbreaker. He has tattoos, which is something that Katara hadn’t noticed beforehand, and they’re beautiful- thousands of intricate little designs inked painstakingly across his forearms and forehead, making up a larger design of long blue arrows.

Every time he comes into the shop, he is loud and friendly and always completely and utterly unabashed. Zuko sneaks him mochi when he thinks Suki and Toph aren’t paying attention, much to everyone’s hidden amusement. And he is also very insistent on befriending Katara, despite all of her attempts to deter him. “I’m Aang,” he introduces himself cheerily, and he seems content to ignore her thin lipped smile and clipped response.

Aang always has something ridiculous to say. He asks her stupid questions like _so Katara, do you think water is wet?_ or _what modern day food do you think would make a child from Roku’s era spontaneously combust?_ or _have you ever seen a bear? not a platypus-bear or an armadillo-bear, just a regular bear?_ He pulls her into conversations seamlessly, and sometimes Katara finds herself laughing along and joking with him and Suki and Toph and Zuko. 

In the moments where Katara forgets herself, she gets to know them, honestly and truly. That’s why she knows that Suki wants to start a martial arts dojo after graduation. That’s why she knows that the only reason Toph has a job is to rebel against her controlling parents. That’s why she knows that Zuko’s been in an on-again, off-again relationship with his girlfriend for the past six months, and it’s driving everyone insane. That’s why she knows that Aang is enrolled in the university’s culinary program- he loves to bake, and hopes to open a fruit pie shop one day.

It would be so easy for Katara to return the favor, to accept their kindness and then give back some of her own. She catches herself doing it sometimes. _Oh, I have an older brother. My family is actually from the South Pole. I wanted to study medicine when I was younger._ Little bits and pieces of herself slip out when she doesn’t pay attention, and if she kept going, kept pushing, she might be able to give them more. Isn’t that what friendship is? Isn’t that what she’s always wanted? But every time she tries, the words get stuck in her throat. And then no amount of glances from Zuko, or questions from Aang, or smiles from Suki and Toph can make things better.


	4. it will always be like having your throat cut

The twelfth anniversary of her mother’s death sneaks up on her. It catches her by surprise in a way that it hasn’t before, and she’s in a fearsome mood when she goes to work that day, because she can’t _believe_ that she’d forgotten. It’s odd, to think that her mother’s been out of her life for far longer than she was ever in it. It aches, to think that as much as she misses her mother, there’s a tiny part of her that resents her, too, because how could she? How could she leave Katara here with _this?_

Katara doesn’t know what her facial expression looks like when she enters the tea shop’s backroom, but it makes Suki grab Toph by the wrist and flee towards the front. Zuko, who’d previously been laughing over something or another, suddenly busies himself with the boxes of _buchi_ in front of him. Katara scowls. Her grief solidifies into something sharp and angry inside her, and the only thing she knows how to do is lash out. So she does.

“You’re doing it wrong,” she snaps. “Move.” She elbows him out of the way and grabs the box herself. Her hands are shaking.

“You’re in a mood today,” Zuko comments, his voice as raspy and dry as ever, but there’s something else there, too. Something tentative and soft. “Is everything okay?”

Katara closes her eyes, because if she doesn’t she thinks she might start crying. “Everything is fine,” she says. “Except for the fact that you’re packing these boxes wrong.”

Silence falls, and Katara continues packing the boxes of _buchi_ like nothing’s wrong. She can feel Zuko’s eyes on her- his gaze is golden and heavy and she hates it, suddenly. Hates the way he’s always trying to figure her out. She thinks he might be driving her mad.

 _“What do you want,”_ she spits, and it’s only slightly unhinged.

He looks taken aback. He swallows, and Katara’s eyes don’t flit down to watch the way his adam’s apple bobs in his throat. They don’t.

Zuko steels himself. “I get that you’re upset about something,” he says eventually. “That seems to be kind of a recurring theme with you. But that doesn’t mean you should let it fester. It’s not good for you. I know that from experience.” That last part is muttered softly, almost under his breath. Katara wonders if she was meant to hear it. 

“What, so you expect me to tell you my whole life story?” Katara says derisively. How dare he _presume,_ when he doesn’t know anything about her. How dare he try to make things better, when _nothing_ and _no one_ can make this better. When she’s going to be carrying this burden around her whole life. How dare he, how dare he, how _dare he-_

“Of course I don’t,” Zuko responds hotly. Katara feels a small rush of satisfaction at this. She’s itching for a fight. Maybe he’ll be the one to give it to her. But then he takes a deep breath to calm himself down. “I just meant that- I know we’re not best friends or anything- I just- if you need to talk, you can talk to me, okay? Or Suki or Toph. Or even Aang, although he doesn’t work here. Okay?”

Katara blinks at him for one long moment. Something inside her unravels. And then, much to her neverending chagrin and humiliation, she starts crying. It happens so quickly that it takes her by surprise, and she claps a hand over her mouth to keep the gasping, shuddering sobs in. 

It doesn’t work.

Zuko is babbling in horror in the background. “Oh, _spirits,”_ he says. “Spirits, Katara, I didn’t mean to make you _cry-_ are you okay? Are you okay?”

“Shut _up,”_ Katara snarls, but it isn’t as threatening as she’d like it to be, given the fact that she says it around a mouthful of tears and snot. “Just shut up for a minute. Please.”

“Okay!” Zuko says hurriedly. His hands are held out placatingly, like he doesn’t know what to do with them. “I’m shutting up, I’m shutting up, I’m shutting up!”

Katara sniffles to try and compose herself. She burns with shame and embarrassment. _How humiliating,_ she thinks, _to be shown the slightest hint of kindness and immediately fall to pieces._ “I’m sorry,” she says after a minute. 

“Don’t be,” says Zuko. His voice is gentle, but he still looks unsure. “Do you- do you want to talk about it?”

Katara sighs, wipes at her eyes. She shouldn’t tell him. She really, really shouldn’t tell him.

She does anyways.

“My mom’s dead,” she says flatly. She’s never told anyone this before. It’s like ripping off a bandage, or peeling back the layers of a satsuma. She feels torn open, wounded, exposed. Maybe she will start bleeding.

Now that she’s begun to speak, all of the words want to fall out. They crawl up her throat and clamor at the backs of her teeth. Katara wants to tell him _everything-_ she just wants to talk to someone, anyone, with an intensity so strong it surprises her. But a glance at Zuko tells her that he’s frozen in shock, like he hadn’t expected her to respond. Her stomach twists painfully, and she can feel herself crumble a little bit. _Stupid,_ she thinks. _Stupid, stupid. You don’t know him, you shouldn’t have told him-_

Zuko reaches out and places a hand on her shoulder. 

Katara stiffens in shock at the feeling. His hands are large, and warm, and they easily encompass the width of her shoulder. The weight is comforting, so unlike the other burdens she’s been carrying around, and Katara wants to melt into it. 

Of course she’s touch starved, she thinks wryly. Of-fucking-course.

“That’s something we have in common,” Zuko says softly. He’s still staring at her closely. Katara can’t quite bring herself to hate him for it.

He keeps trying to figure her out. She thinks she could let him.

_Is this what it feels like to be seen?_


	5. what mirrors we are (set to face each other, reflecting desire)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shmall kine update to close out the week ;)

They don’t talk about it afterwards. There’s not anything to say, really. But that doesn’t stop Katara from replaying the moment over and over and over again in her head.

_ That’s something we have in common, _ Zuko says, and Katara replies with  _ I’m sorry _ and lets his hand on her shoulder keep her tethered to the earth.

_ That’s something we have in common, _ Zuko says, and Katara spits out  _ as if I care _ just to start a fight and see his face twist up in anger.

_ That’s something we have in common, _ Zuko says, and Katara only smiles sadly, then turns and throws her arms around him in a hug.

All the ways it could’ve gone. The one way that it did:

_ That’s something we have in common, _ Zuko says, and Katara’s throat closes up. She stares at him until his hand drops from her shoulder, and they go back to packaging the boxes of  _ buchi _ like nothing ever happened at all.

-

Zuko looks at her, now, when he thinks she’s not looking. It’s different from the way he’d looked at her before- then, it had been hesitant, cautious, like he was trying to get something right. Like he was trying to figure out what made her tick. Now, he looks at her like he understands. As if he knows her.

He doesn’t, of course, but it’s unsettling, especially because every time  _ she _ looks at  _ him,  _ she has no idea what he’s thinking. His facial expressions are always unreadable, as if he was carved from stone. She studies the lines of his face and the contours of his cheekbones, the curves of his chin and the set of his mouth. He is an unknown entity to her- he always has been, but now something is different. Something is off.

She is always reminded of the curse when he looks at her, even more so than when she speaks to Aang or Toph or Suki. She doesn’t entirely have the wherewithal to determine why, and even if she did, she’s not sure she wants to know. 

-

_ Stupid girl, _ her mother hisses to her in the quiet moments. In the spaces where there’s nothing but Katara and her thoughts, where it feels like the whole world could swallow her up without a trace.  _ You’re just showing yourself all the things you can never have. _

Katara does not like to think about Kya. Even though she can always hear her voice in the back of her mind, she does not think about her, because it hurts so badly to remember her mother, vibrant and lovely, wasting away because she gave up too much of her heart.

Katara has spent her whole life trying not to follow in those footsteps. She has left  _ everything _ behind. She doesn’t talk to her father, doesn’t talk to her brother. She abandoned her thoughts of romance and her dreams of altruism in order to survive, to make it through the day. She has embraced the entirety of being alone; she is doomed to always have one foot out the door.

But sometimes, she forgets- she finds herself slipping away when she talks to Suki, or shares a baked good with Aang, or when Toph punches her on the shoulder.

But then Zuko studies her with those eyes, and it’s like a bucket of ice water is poured over her head, every single time. Zuko looks her way, and the fragments of her dream reality shatter and disappear, never to be seen again. He is a reminder, in a way, that this isn’t real. It can’t ever be. 

_ He looks at you and shows you false truths. They can’t see you the way you want them to. So why do you keep going back? _

It’s a vicious cycle.

She always ends up hurt.

She does not want to break it.

And yet. 

She wants to keep living in this blissful ignorance. She wants to keep pushing away the loneliness; she wants to keep silencing her mother’s voice, the one that warns and frets and worries. The one that sat her down fourteen years ago and altered the course of her life. 

The walls she has built around herself could come tumbling down at any minute. She has to proceed with caution, because every step forward also sends her two steps back. But after a decade of loneliness, of silent nights and dreams shot to hell, Katara is finding it harder and harder to care.

_ Suki and Toph and Aang and Zuko, _ her mind whispers, and she ignores the way her heart feels full. 

-

In the middle of it all, his eyes are still watching her.

Liquid smooth. Molten gold.

She wonders when she started trying to figure him out, the same way he’s always tried to figure out her.


	6. you are going to break your promise (i understand)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry it's been a while! school was kind of hectic but finals ended last week and now i have time to finish this up before i go back. xoxo

In another life, Katara thinks that Suki and her would be great friends. The other girl is a few months older than her, and she’s chatty and vivacious and warm, everything Katara wishes she could be. Suki always has a smile or wave or conspiratorial joke to offer when they work together, and the knowledge that Katara is constantly in the presence of someone who _could_ be her friend, if things were different, doesn’t hurt as much as it used to.

That particular realization is startling and abrupt. It’s a _good_ thing, overall, but still- resignation is always difficult pill to swallow.

This is all she can have. She might as well be grateful. (She ignores the way that thought slides bitter down her throat.)

Katara is musing over her newfound discoveries at the cash register when Suki comes back from taking out the trash, and announces, completely and utterly out of the blue, “I’m just going to say this straight up. What is going _on_ with you and Zuko?”

Katara gawks at the other girl and drops the roll of coins she’s holding. “I’m sorry, _what?”_ she asks incredulously. “There’s nothing going on with me and Zuko. At all.” 

Suki blinks at her, once, twice, three times. Then she lets out a loud bleat of laughter. “Are you _sure?”_ she asks. “Are you _sure_ about that?”

Katara suddenly feels very, very indignant. As if Zuko being nice to her _one time_ meant that they had something _going on_ . That doesn’t mean anything. It can’t mean anything. It doesn’t matter if she watches him from afar while he works; it doesn’t matter if he was the only person to _truly_ reach out to her for the first time in _years._ It doesn’t matter if she sees glinting eyes and a crooked smile before she falls asleep at night. “Of course I’m sure,” Katara snits. “We don’t even talk to each other on a regular basis. There’s nothing there.”

Suki lets out another loud laugh. “Katara, I know your personal brand is _mysterious tea shop enigma_ and that none of us actually know anything about you, but believe me when I say this. There is definitely something there. You could literally cut the tension with an knife.”

Katara flushes red hot. She’s making things up. She’s lying. She has to be. 

_Suki doesn’t lie_ , hisses her mother’s voice angrily. _Suki doesn’t lie, not like you. You know she’s telling the truth. You hoped for it. You did._

_Tread carefully, Katara._

Katara inhales shakily, takes in the feelings and then lets them go. Her heart is beating rapidly. This is dangerous. This is untrue. It has to be.

“You’re wrong,” she tells Suki flatly, after a moment of agitated silence. The other girl is looking at her oddly. 

“You’re wrong,” Katara insists again. She must sound so desperate. 

Suki just shrugs and goes to the sink to wash her hands.

“Suit yourself,” she says, and they are quiet for the rest of the shift. 

-

Katara can count the amount of times she’s talked to Toph individually on one hand. She likes the younger girl, she really does, but there’s a distance between them that neither seems willing to cross. 

(It’s Katara’s fault- everything always is- but that’s besides the point.)

That’s why it’s all the more surprising when Toph stops her one afternoon, a few weeks after her odd conversation with Suki, right before Katara’s about to clock out for the day.

“Hold it,” she says, one hand held up to halt Katara’s path. “I wanted to talk to you, actually.”

“Oh,” says Katara. Her palms are suddenly sweaty, and a prickle of unease trickles down her spine. “What’s up, Toph?”

Toph tilts her head to the side, and Katara has the most uncanny feeling that the other girl’s sightless eyes are staring at her. “What’s going on with you and Zuko?” she asks, and Katara’s stomach flips. _Not this again._

“There’s _nothing_ going on with me and Zuko,” says Katara tersely. “Nothing at all.”

Toph pauses for a moment, like she’s waiting for Katara to continue. When she doesn’t elaborate, Toph lets out a little snort, like she’s amazed by her audacity. “Whatever you say, Katara,” she trills, her voice singsong, and Katara grits her teeth, because she’s telling the truth. First Suki, now Toph. Why are these people, who are virtual strangers to her, so insistent on getting involved in her personal life? Why are they making a big deal out of things that aren’t there? 

_Not true, not true, not true,_ her mother’s voice chimes in. Katara ignores it. This is only making her feel worse- right when she thought she could deal with it. Right when she thought she had accepted the way of things. 

“He broke up with his girlfriend. For reals, this time,” Toph adds randomly. She sounds soft instead of mocking, now, like she knows something Katara doesn’t. It stings. Katara doesn’t care that Zuko broke up with his girlfriend. Katara doesn’t care that Toph is probably only trying to help her. She doesn’t.

 _Not true, not true, not true,_ says Kya’s voice again, and Katara’s fraying patience finally snaps.

“Why should I care about that?” she snarls to Toph, hoping that it hides the shaking of her voice. She rips her apron off and throws it into the basket for dirty linens next to the trash. “I don’t know what you think is going on, Toph, but whatever you believe, you’re mistaken.” She stomps out of the back room, utterly and completely done for the day, so she misses Toph’s furrowed brows and pensive expression.

“Your heartbeat says otherwise,” Toph mutters to herself, then turns back to the boxes of tea. 

-

Katara can’t sleep. Katara can’t concentrate. Katara can’t stop thinking, a million different things colliding in her brain. She hears Suki’s words, and sees Toph’s confused facial expression, and pictures the way Zuko’s hair catches the overhead lights in the shop, glistens soft and shiny. She remembers how her mother’s eyes looked, sunken deep in her face, as she wasted away in a hospital bed and no one did anything to save her. She remembers the way her father disappeared into himself, after, and the way that her brother chased behind him in a race he would never get to win. She remembers the feeling of warmth that always expands outwards from her chest every time Zuko looks up at her and catches her in a half smile while Suki and Toph and Aang laugh and tell jokes in the tea shop.

She can’t think. She can’t think anymore. 

_Something has to give_ , Katara gasps desperately, late at night into the silence of her apartment. The darkness swallows up her words. _I can’t keep doing this anymore._ _I can’t, I can’t, I can’t_ _I can’t I can’t-_

Her sleep is fitful that night. She dreams of her mother’s hands, brushing out the waves of her hair, and she wakes up crying.


	7. toph's interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> first of two updates today. happy holidays :)

Toph is blind.

This is a commonly known fact. Her eyes are sightless, and they have been since birth. She will never know what she looks like in the mirror, or what color the sky is, or how a person’s face crinkles when it smiles. 

But just because she is _blind_ doesn’t mean that she can’t _see._ In fact, Toph prides herself on being able to see better than most people. She was born with it, in a way- an innate ability to read the vibrations in the earth, to sense people’s forms and movements. It’s old, old magic, the kind that still exists in the world, if only you know where to look. And it’s better than being able to see with her eyes, in her opinion. No one’s ever asked her, though, so she hasn’t ever said anything.

Sensing every vibration in the earth means that Toph’s senses are always on high alert. She feels the movement every time someone so much as blinks. Heartbeats, breathing, blood pressure- Toph can sense it all. People can lie to her face all they want, but their bodies always tell the truth. She knows everything. She can figure out anyone.

Well. Anyone except for Katara. 

The girl is an enigma. Toph can’t quite get a read on her- her vital signs are always near a the levels of a spirits-damned nervous breakdown, _especially_ her heartbeat, and she has this weird energy around her, like she’s trapped in some hazy kind of cloud. Katara can’t sit still, she’s always twitching- her fingers are always drumming on the counter, or she’s fiddling with the pendant that dangles from her neck, or she’s tapping her foot mindlessly. Tension always hangs heavy in the set of her shoulders, and her jaw is always clenched so hard Toph thinks it’s a miracle she’s never cracked a tooth.

Katara is _sad_. Toph doesn’t know much about her, but she knows that. It radiates off her in waves, thick and cloying, like one of the expensive perfumes Toph’s mother wears. She is sad, and weary, and Toph doesn’t consider herself to be a very sympathetic person, but something about Katara makes her gut twist. 

What happens to a person, Toph wonders sometimes, that makes them feel so utterly, completely, desolately alone?

She isn’t sure she ever wants to know. 

So she tries her best to reach out, alongside do Suki and Zuko and even Aang, on the days he comes into the shop. And every time they do, Toph can _feel_ Katara struggling with herself. She can feel the way her lips twitch into an almost smile before smoothing over again, and she can feel the way the other girl’s heartbeat leaps in excitement. But it doesn’t matter, because every time Katara lets herself slip, she catches herself just as quickly. The moment passes, and no one knows anything more about their coworker than they did before. 

Katara reminds Toph of Zuko, in a way, before he underwent years of therapy and got his shit together. They both have high emotional energy, but Zuko’s has cooled over the years, softened into something generous and kind and loving. Katara isn’t like that. She’s rougher around the edges, like a knife that’s been left out to rust.

Katara comes into work angry. That’s nothing unusual. But one day, her rage and sorrow is more palpable than usual- it’s practically boiling over. Everyone notices, and they distance themselves accordingly. Suki drags Toph out of the back room by her arm, and Toph is only a little bit regretful of the fact that she can’t eavesdrop on the drama that is sure to develop. 

Interestingly enough, Zuko stays behind. 

The shift is subtle, but when Toph picks up on it, it takes her by surprise. And that’s a shock, in and of itself, because _nothing_ takes Toph Beifong by surprise.

Zuko’s heartbeat is normal around Katara. And then, the next day, it’s not. 

_Interesting._

Toph pays more attention to the two of them after that. Katara’s vibrations are a wreck around Zuko, now, and Zuko just watches her when he thinks no one is looking, his heart _thump thump thumping_ in his chest.

She’s starting to think that she might not be the only blind one around here.


	8. bad luck relies on absolutely perfect timing

In all honesty, Katara probably should've seen the whole thing coming. 

She doesn't, though, and that makes all the difference.

-

She's working the closing shift at the tea shop. Zuko’s there too- he swapped shifts with Suki, who had a midterm or something to cram for. As they move around, wiping down tables and putting up chairs, Katara thinks it’s a miracle that he can’t hear the pounding of her heart. She’s nervous, for absolutely no reason, and it’s making her jittery.

They work for a while in stilted silence. Katara wonders if Zuko feels as supremely uncomfortable as she does. She hopes not. It’s not like he has any reason to.

She’s in the middle of emptying out the cash register when Zuko clears his throat. “Hey,” he says hesitantly, in his dry, lilting rasp. He’s holding up a bottle of soju. Katara has no idea where he got it. “Do you- uh. Do you want to have a drink? I do this with Toph and Suki when we work a closing shift. It’s kind of tradition. You don’t have to, though, I just-”

Katara stares at him for a moment, long enough for Zuko’s tentative smile to falter, for red to climb up the back of his neck, flush on his good cheek. 

“Okay,” says Katara eventually. It surprises them both. They are not quite friends, they don’t talk to each other all that much, but still. She wants to do this with him. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

-

Zuko pulls down two chairs at one of the tables nearest to the door. He pours the soju into two tiny teacups and chuckles self consciously when Katara raises an eyebrow at him. “There’s no shot glasses in here,” he huffs.

Katara just hums, amused despite herself, a small smile twitching at her lips, then throws back her drink. It only burns a little bit when it glides down her throat. They sit quietly for a while. Zuko refills their cups occasionally, and- it’s _nice,_ to sit here in companionable silence with him. It’s nice to pretend the odd tension between them doesn’t exist; it’s nice to pretend that she’s normal. 

“So,” Zuko says eventually. The alcohol has loosened him up, made him more relaxed. If Katara’s being totally honest, it’s probably done the same to her. Her face feels very flushed, and when Zuko looks over at her, the rare, thousand watt smile on his face makes her hands shake. 

They do that sometimes, when he’s around, no matter how many times she tries to get them to stop. She’s dangling on a precipice, she knows it— she just can’t figure out what’s waiting for her on the bottom. Katara closes her eyes for just a moment. Shoves down these strange things she’s feeling so she can pretend they don’t exist, so she can center herself in another age-old attempt to be cautious. Then she turns to face him fully. “So,” she responds, trying to keep her voice steady. 

The dim lighting of the shop has turned Zuko’s face into a study of contrasts, highlighting his sharp cheekbones and angular jawline, shadowing his golden eyes and his smile, and Katara’s mouth goes dry. He is still wearing his work apron. It looks unfairly good on him. 

This whole thing is new, unfamiliar and strange. She thinks it also might be a little bit wrong. But the alcohol is making her inhibitions disappear, and her mother’s voice, usually so loud and persistent, has yet to surface. The silence is deafening. 

His eyes are boring into her, just like they always do. Like he knows something she doesn’t, liquid smooth, molten gold. 

“Toph told me about your girlfriend,” Katara blurts, after desperately racking her brain for something, _anything_ to say. 

The smile disappears abruptly; the light in those eyes flickers just a tad. Katara immediately wants to take back what she’s said. _Wait,_ she thinks. _Wait, come back._

“Sorry,” she amends hastily. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have brought it up-”

“No, it’s okay,” Zuko reassures her. The smile is back, but it’s dimmer than before, and Katara’s heart clenches in her chest. “Toph likes to gossip. But, uh, yeah. I think we’re done for good this time.” 

“Oh,” Katara says. She wishes she had more to offer. She wishes she could comfort him. She wishes- 

She wants-

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she settles on, feeling supremely awkward and completely out of her element. She clears her throat uneasily. “Really.”

Zuko shrugs. “It’s probably for the best at this point. We were kind of stuck, you know? It was time for a change. And you know, we’d been on and off for ages, and just- things built on instability aren’t ever going to last.”

Katara nods, because _that_ she understands. She thinks of her mother’s ghost, and her father’s sadness, and her curse. Instability doesn’t even begin to describe the foundation her family was built on, and that hadn’t lasted either. “But I’m still sorry, Zuko.”

Zuko leans forward then. His gaze has mellowed into something warm and steady, and his hands are splayed out towards his on the table. Katara realizes with a start that she’s gravitated closer to him, and she can’t. She can’t look away. 

The nearness of him feels like it might light her on fire, and when he oh-so-slowly reaches out to caress her jaw, tuck a wayward strand of hair behind her ear, her eyes flutter shut. She leans into it, she can’t help herself, and- and his hands are so warm, and his touch is so gentle. A jolt of electricity flows down her spine, and her her heart is a wild thing in her chest. She can’t control it.

“I’ll get over it,” Zuko says, and his voice is barely above a whisper. They are so close, and her senses are going wild with it- it’s him, him, only him, and he smells like cedar and woodsmoke and his hair is shining and his eyes are _burning,_ burning gold. 

“Yeah,” Zuko says, almost to himself. Katara can’t look away. She doesn't want to.

“I think I’ll get over it.” 

-

In the space between moments, Katara realizes some very important things. 

Her whole life, she’s been walking on eggshells, trying to avoid this _thing_. She can’t even name it, this pull in her gut, this feeling that wants and burns and _yearns._ She’s always been so careful, always denied herself _everything_ , until the night she went to a party for Toph and Suki and subsequently upended her entire life. All of the rash, stupid choices she’s made over the past two months have been building to right now, and her footing on that precipice becomes more and more unsteady as the minutes tick by.

Katara can’t have anything real. She knows that. But it doesn’t matter, because Zuko is leaning in, and he is warm and steady and solid and real. And she is so _tired_ of being careful, _tired_ of hearing her mother’s voice scolding her, _tired_ of pushing people away. 

She wants this so badly.

She cannot have it.

She’s going to take it anyways.

And it will be _fine,_ because it has to be fine, because she’ll make it fine. 

In the space between moments, Katara throws caution to the wind.

It’s a collision course that plays in slow motion when he kisses her.

-

Everything floats away.

Her anger and her fear and her mother’s warning voice in the back of her head- they all disappear when Zuko slots his lips over hers and it sets of a series of fireworks in Katara’s chest, aching and bright and beautiful. 

She has no idea what she’s doing, but it doesn’t matter, because his mouth is on hers and his hands are caressing her face and she has a fistful of his hair in her grip. They’re leaning over the table, and it’s a little bit uncomfortable, but Katara doesn’t _care_. She keeps going, and Zuko matches her, and they may have stayed like that forever if Katara didn’t accidentally knock over the bottle of soju.

It shatters when it hits the floor, spilling clear liquid everywhere, and the moment is over. Katara wrenches herself away, gasping. Zuko looks wrecked, pupils blown, lips swollen, and she knows she must not look much better. The enormity of it all hits her, and she is jolted abruptly back to reality, because _what has she done._ _What has she done?_

_Does it matter?_

She kind of wants to do it again. 

“I-” Zuko begins, his voice unsure, and Katara doesn’t know exactly what he’ll say next, but she has a feeling that it will throw her world off its axis once again, and she can’t have that. She can’t. So she interrupts him before he can get a word out. 

“Do you want to go upstairs? Um- to my place?” she asks, hoping that her voice isn’t too high pitched. Because this is fine. It has to be fine. _She will make it fine_. 

Zuko looks surprised. The hazy look on his face is disappearing, quickly being replaced by confusion. “Katara, I-”

 _“Do you want to go upstairs,”_ Katara says, and she’s sure he can hear the desperation in her voice. She doesn’t know what she’s doing, she doesn’t know a thing, but she wants this, with every fiber of her being, every inch of her soul. She wants whatever this turns out to be. Just for tonight.

Zuko swallows. He’s studying her, assessing her with his eyes. That _look_ is back on his face. “Okay,” he whispers finally, and then he’s reaching for her. “Yeah, let’s go.”

 _Stupid girl. Stupid, stupid,_ stupid _girl._ Kya’s voice says, returning from its momentary leave of absence. 

_Just shut the fuck up_ , Katara tells it. _Shut the fuck up. Just this once. I have it under control_. 

She falls into Zuko’s touch like it’s gravity, and the feeling of his lips on hers almost seems inevitable. His hand cards through her hair, and she could _fly_ , up, up and away, just like this. 

Katara stopped believing in good, pure magic when she was eight. But right now, at this singular point in time, she lets herself believe that maybe sometimes, fantastical things happen. Sometimes, the world is kind.

It’s been so long since she’s been held.

-

She has it under control, she tells herself as they stumble upstairs, careful not to trip on each other, careful not to wake her neighbors in the hall. She has it under control and it will be fine. She will make it fine.

It doesn’t matter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> she's emotionally stunted, your honor
> 
> hope you guys enjoyed! merry christmas, if you celebrate <3


	9. on the other side is after

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hiii i didn't forget about this! i've just been busy :)
> 
> ps: this program does acknowledge the existence of sex. nothing explicit but it is lightly implied. let me know if i should up the rating!
> 
> enjoy <3

Katara has no idea what she was doing. It doesn’t matter, though, because Zuko does, and when he touches her, she feels like she’s floating. She’s out of control, no longer in her body, moving on instinct and nothing but the purest, deepest, pleasure.

It’s not too shabby for a girl who’s actively avoided human contact for years, honestly.

Zuko curls around her when they finish, his body warm and solid beside her, and she can’t stop herself from leaning into his touch, soaking up his warmth. Her eyes flutter shut, and she thinks, for half a second, that this is it. She could stay here, like this, hanging in the soft space that is  _ after _ forever and ever and ever.

And then she remembers. 

Twelve years of isolation and walls and  _ alone alone alone _ and she’s undone it all in the span of one night. One night with a boy who makes her hands shake. One night with a boy who is not quite her friend, but he could be, if she wanted. He’s just within her reach.

_ It doesn’t have to mean anything, _ she tells herself. Zuko’s breathing has evened out beside her. She thinks he might be asleep, and the knowledge of it makes something in her soften and unravel.  _ It doesn’t have to mean anything at all. _

_ You’re lying to yourself,  _ Kya taunts her. She is always there, always in the back of Katara’s brain.

Not for the first time, Katara ignores her mother’s voice.

-

Zuko isn’t there when Katara wakes up in the morning.

She shoves down the shreds of disappointment that crawl up her throat when she realizes. It’s probably for the best, she thinks. Because if he’d stayed, they would’ve had to talk. A real conversation, not just snippets of tension-filled small talk, the way they are in the tea shop.

Katara gets out of bed, winces at the soreness in her hips, her legs. Ignores the way the other side of her bed smells like woodsmoke and cedar. She wraps herself in an oversized robe and then meanders over to her closet, where she keeps every single book and journal and document detailing the specificities of her- her  _ problem. _ Twelve years of research, and the amount of information she’s found is  _ pitiful, _ truly. She tears through the pages, looking for something, anything, to justify what she’s just done. She’s looking for anything that will tell her that she didn’t burn it all down. Anything that will let her stay, because she’s  _ built  _ something here, and she doesn’t want to let it go. 

There is no new information, nothing other than what her mother told her, and what she found on her own. Blood curses, like the one that has plagued Katara’s family for ages, are remnants of days past, when mythical powers ruled the world. When people could bend water and fire and earth and air.

No one knows how to break it. And so Katara cannot fall in love.

She sighs heavily and sinks down to the floor. She is drowning in indecision, in guilt, in grief. She replays every interaction with Zuko that led up to the events of last night in her mind. And then she comes to a conclusion.

She does not  _ love _ him, that much is certain. She can say the words out loud and know them to be true. She doesn’t love him- she doesn’t even know him. Last night was a one time thing, something she needed after years of being alone. 

Relief washes over her, cool and calming. She doesn’t love him. She doesn’t think she’d even know how to. 

_ You’re grasping at straws _ , Kya’s voice whispers.

_ No I’m not _ , Katara thinks, affronted. This is casual. It doesn’t mean anything. And she can rationalize it, she can salvage things. The carefully constructed life she’s built here doesn’t have to come tumbling down after one night. She can still have the tea shop and Suki and Toph and Aang. She can still live in this little apartment, with its bright walls and bay windows. And maybe she can even have Zuko, in a free and easy sort of way. No strings attached, is what they call it.

No strings attached. 

For the first time in a long time, Katara lets the seeds of hope take root inside her heart, and push their way up and out. For the first time in a long time, Katara lets herself dream of something more. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> also, for the record: bending exists in this universe, but it kind of died out. some people still have traces of it (like if you go back and read toph's interlude, that's how she can see) but it's not common and most people don't know it by name. it's just there :) magical realism babey!
> 
> come chat w me on [twitter!](https://twitter.com/kahakaiss) i'm going to try and put out another chapter later today. xoxo

**Author's Note:**

> chapter title from deathless by catherynne valente


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